Their joyful singing spilled from a campus meeting room. Some had raised their hands, palms upward, in adoration to God; others had bowed their heads and closed their eyes. Someone called out a hymn number, and then he said loudly enough for everyone to hear, “I remember we sang this hymn in the first meeting I came to.” They began to sing Oh the Deep Deep Love of Jesus.
That InterVarsity meeting, he remembered, was more than fifty years ago. Since then the world has changed, and so have these InterVarsity alumni. But throughout the decades they have all remained friends and stayed in touch. About forty-five Michigan Christian Fellowship students from the 1940s and 1950s met again for a reunion in Ann Arbor, Michigan, August 10-12, 2005. Over the decades, they have encouraged one another through the challenges of marriage, parenthood, and growing old. And they have financially supported those who heard God’s call to missions around the world.
These men and women exemplify the fruit InterVarsity hopes will result as we teach students to study the Scripture, pray together, and to respond to God’s call in every area of their lives. Though they have mostly finished their careers and are retired now, they are still remarkably energetic and active. In the last 50 years they have invented new cleaner processes for the petrochemical industry, translated the Scriptures in remote parts of Peru, taught students in universities around the world, pastored churches, raised children, planted gardens, and started service organizations. As medical doctors, missionaries, professors, academic deans, authors, sculptors, scientists, and parents, they have helped to change the world.
They arrived at the University of Michigan as serious students who had already been exposed to the needs of the world by the Second World War. Some had come from devout Christian families, others had learned about Jesus for the first time through the evangelistic efforts of this InterVarsity chapter. “I thought I already knew a lot about Christianity,” said one alumni, “but InterVarsity taught me to study the Bible for myself.” They learned to pray together and have quiet times. For many, the habits begun in college have lasted a lifetime. Together they have taken their faith seriously and sought to respond in obedience to God.
In InterVarsity we long to see students and faculty transformed, the university renewed, and the world changed. That is exactly what has happened in and through these MCF alumni.
